Friday, June 10, 2005

Disenfranchising Women with Sexist Advertising

How does "in your face" sexuality in advertising aimed at the 18-34 year old affect women, particularly Boomer Women (the group with the bucks)? My contention is that if you objectify women in your advertising, you will dissaffect women (and the men) who came of age during the feminist revolution. According to the Advertising Research Center website; http://www.trial.warc.com/WARCAdvice/QuickBriefs/Sample.asp:

"Women may account for as much as 80% of all consumer purchases (5) – even in China (8) – and are the target group for the majority of all advertising (2). So it is legitimate to ask why it should be necessary to treat them as special in some way (2).

There are, in fact, several reasons for doing so:
• women's roles in society have changed dramatically over the last 50 years, and many marketers' thinking has failed to keep pace (eg 1)
• women think differently from men, and this is not regularly factored into our communication planning (3); this matters because the creative departments of ad agencies tend to be populated by young males, who are not necessarily in tune with women's ways of thinking (2), though good creatives ought to be able to empathise with such a major target (15)
• too often women are portrayed in ads – whether targeted at men or women – in sexist, demeaning or stereotyped ways (11, 12, 15)

So, I "axe" this question: Upon viewing the Axe deoderant, for example, that has the mother of the young women showing off her natural assets to her daughter's date -- would any mother in her right mind buy this product? So, you mother-f______s,
go get a clue!

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